If you take sin lightly—if you think God does not note, and punish for sin—you need to learn, now, just how God dealt with His chosen people for breaking His Sabbath.

If God always punishes for sin, then why did Jesus, who came to reveal the Father in heaven, not condemn and punish the woman caught in the act of adultery? (John 8:3, 10-11) Or does the reader now side with the Pharisees?

Do you know why the Kingdom of Judah was later taken captive, and scattered over the world? Both houses of Israel were sent into national punishment and banishment from the Holy Land because they broke God’s Sabbath!

That was not the only reason. They had rebelled against the entire Mosaic Law.

Does it make any difference? It certainly made a lot of difference to God! And He says He has not changed—He is the same yesterday, today, and forever! (Heb. 13:8.)

The author is taking this verse—which refers to building our lives on Jesus Christ who never changes—out of context. He sees God’s Law given to Israel as being like the Medes and the Persians, that changes not. But if we conclude that God holds all mankind in every age to His Law, especially the Sabbath, then we would still be sacrificing animals; we would still be circumcising our male newborns, and many other laws in the old covenant. Can we agree that God is rational? Would God make a covenant between two parties, then at some other time spring the surprise on mankind that they, too, were parties of the contract, who were not there, neither gave their approval to? Sounds strange, but this is what you must conclude if you believe the Law, especially the Sabbath, is binding on Gentiles, or Christians.

It was so important to God that He punished His own chosen people with this most severe national punishment—defeat in war—being taken from their land, and made slaves in a foreign land!

God performed that which was in the covenant, if Israel did not hold up their end of the covenant.

Sin is defined by God as the transgression of His Law (I John 3:4). 

The Greek anomia does not support the interpretation of sin as being the "transgression of the law." Anomia is translated iniquity, which can exist outside law. Adam sinned without "the law." When we trusted Christ, we became dead (or died) to the Law, arose from the dead with Christ and are now married (united) to Him. (Romans 7:4). 

"Ye shall make you no idols nor graven image...to bow down unto it: for I am the Eternal your God. Ye shall keep my Sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Eternal" (verses 1-2).

In offering the following promises for obedience, or punishments for rebellion, in this key prophecy, only the two Commandments were mentioned—those against idolatry and Sabbath breaking.

You would conclude, therefore, that Christ would return and punish the world for the same reason, if it were indeed a covenant binding on all mankind. Ephesians 5:5-6 "For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience." Colossians 3:5-6 "Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry: For which things sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience..." No mention of Sabbath breaking.

"If ye walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them..." God promised abundant production and wealth, national peace, and national dominance that would have led to world dominance (verses 3-13).

One might conclude world dominance would result, but it is an assumption.

After the division into two nations—when the Kingdom of Israel made Jeroboam their king, the first thing this king did was introduce idolatry and Sabbath-breaking.

Where's the scriptural reference? (Read ESN article: Did Jeroboam Change the Sabbath to Sunday?)

Ezekiel was given a message from God to the House of Israel (not the House of Judah). Ezekiel was among the Jewish captives, after their captivity, more than a hundred years after Israel's captivity. By that time Assyrians had been defeated by the king of Babylon. They later left their land on the southern shores of the Caspian Sea and migrated northwest, finally settling in the land called Germany today.

Where’s the documentation?

The people of the House of Israel also migrated northwest across Europe. But they did not stop in Germany. They went on farther west and north—into Western Europe--France, Belgium, Holland, the Scandinavian countries, and the British Isles—where they are to this day, except for the Tribe of Manasseh, which much later migrated to the United States.

No historical documentation or references. There were no "lost ten tribes."  James wrote in Js. 1:1: "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting." (See our research article: Where Are the Lost Tribes of Israel Located?)

"Go speak unto the House of Israel," said God (Ezek. 3:1).

But Ezekiel never took that message to the lost House of Israel. He couldn't. He was a slave. 

Ezekiel did go to Israel, then in captivity. Read the rest of Ezekiel the third chapter. God took him to them. The statement above is an outright lie.

"But the house of Israel rebelled against me in the wilderness: they walked not in My statutes, and they despised My judgments...and My Sabbaths they greatly polluted" (verse 13).

And what is the exact wording? My Sabbaths--plural. How can this be talking about the forever-binding Sabbath when it is talking about more than one kind of Sabbath?

Then God pleaded with their children, a generation later. Notice!

"But I said unto their children in the wilderness, Walk ye not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols: I am the Eternal your God; walk in my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them; And hallow my Sabbaths; ..." (verses 18-20).

Notice it!

The entire emphasis here is between God's statutes, judgments, and Sabbaths on the one hand, and their fathers' different Sabbaths, statutes and judgments.

The Scripture referenced does not say, "their Sabbaths."

He scattered them, in national captivity and slavery (verse 23).

But why?

Because they had not executed my judgments, but had despised my statutes, and had polluted my Sabbaths, and their eyes were after their fathers' idols" (verse 24).

Earlier, Herbert Armstrong claimed these things came on Israel for idolatry and Sabbath breaking. Now he concedes it was much more.

Notice it! This is the Word speaking—Christ! He will then be on earth again in Person! And then He is going to plead with our people face to face. That will happen to you, and to your loved ones.

God is going to plead with the descendants of Israel, not "us Christians."

Perhaps only one lone voice is warning you! But God used one lone voice to warn the world in Noah's day—one lone voice in Elijah's day—one lone voice in the day of John the Baptist, and after he was put in Prison, in the Person of Christ Himself!

How many people were alive in Noah's day, and how widely were they dispersed? How many people was Elijah witnessing to? John the Baptist never spoke beyond the boundaries of Israel, and neither did Jesus. But Jesus sent out his 12, and all those who believed, spread the Word of God. It wasn’t left up to one person.

Notice how he will plead!

"Like as I pleaded with your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt, so will I plead with you, saith the Lord Eternal... And I will purge out from among you the rebels, and them that transgress against me...and ye shall know that I am the Lord" (verses 36-38).

How did He plead with them? He pleaded: "Hallow my Sabbaths, instead of your fathers', so that you may know that I am Lord.

One little problem here. The geographical reference: "in the wilderness of the land of Egypt" prior to the giving of the Law, which occurred after they left Egypt. And this does not clearly indicate that it is the subject that defines how he pleaded with the fathers, but that he did make a plea to them, as he will make a plea to their children.

And how shall we know that He is the Lord?

By His Sabbath sign!

Question: Could a false Christ or a false minister set up mandatory observance of the Sabbath?

Read verses 42-44 in your own Bible! He says our people, when they are no longer rebellious, who will then be keeping His Sabbath, shall remember their ways in which they were defiled, and shall loathe themselves for their Sabbath-breaking!

There is no reference here that mentions the Sabbath in Ezek 20:42-44.

This is pretty strong teaching! It is the Word of God speaking to you!

If you were an Israelite.

HWA has yet to provide evidence that Christians are to keep the Sabbath. Instead he has so far looked to where Israel was to keep the Sabbath, and implies what was written and spoken to them somehow applies to Christians.

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